One sister in the Lord’s church opened her front door to the words, “Oh, we’re so glad to find you at home.” Not recognising them and thinking that one looked a little like her husband’s side of the family, she asked sheepishly, “Are you relatives of my husband?” The couple smiled and replied, “No, we are Jehovah’s Witnesses.”
In the old days stories were told of religious fanatics “putting their foot in your door to get the last word in.” I always wondered if some of those stories were urban legends borrowed from tales of over-exuberate Encyclopaedia salesmen or debt collectors.
Recent decades have seen a softening in the approach of door-to-door campaigners of all persuasions. Even by the mid-1990s certain religious canvassers were encouraged to “wipe their feet and move on quickly” if you showed no interest in listening to them. In recent times those knocking at our door have all tended, as the JWs above, to greet us like long-lost friends.
It’s hard to automatically switch into Evangelism Mode when opening the door to a stranger. However, let me assure you, you may not be ready to defend your faith, but they are!
We must be like the soccer-mad coach who nicknamed his team, “A-Ready!” As far as he was concerned his team could take the field at any moment because they were “Always ready to play and win!”
Of course, ours is not a game. Souls are at risk. We owe it to our neighbours, though some be deluded, to be ready to share the saving truth of Jesus.
“But sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; (1 Peter 3:15).
John Staiger